Re: Are 'best' universities being targeted

[slinky.cs.nyu.edu!slinky.cs.nyu.edu!nobody@nyu.edu (Robert Dewar)]

In discussing computer science at the "best universities" [whatever that may
mean], I think it is important to understand that very little of computer
science is concerned with programming per se, or software at all for that
matter. Consequently the number of CS faculty who know much about programming
is typically quite small, they are experts in their fields, and programming
does not have much to do with many fields in CS. The number of faculty members
who know anything about software engineering is even smaller.

I recall one instance at a large university in the CS department where there
was energetic debate and breast-beating over the fact that some undergraduate
had interviewed for a job and not known what a finite state machine was. Now
actually I suspect the student had probably been taught this several times
[faculty membes will persist in confusing curriculum with student knowledge!]
but my reaction was something like:

  "well, sure it's disappointing that a student doesn't know what an FSM is,
   but in some respects I am more disturbed by the fact that are undergrads
   are much more unlikely to know what CASE is all about."

The reaction from most of the faculty was "what the heck is CASE?" :-)